


The Weight of Mistakes

by jc_aka_why_me



Category: Mo Dao Zu Shi, The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV), 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù
Genre: Domestic, Heartache, Mistakes, Other, dad wangji, parenting, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-27
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:46:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22429588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jc_aka_why_me/pseuds/jc_aka_why_me
Summary: Little A-Yuan has made a simple mistake in one of his many homeworks.. As he asks his adoptive father Lan Wangji, in the presence of Lan Xichen, however what so bad about a mistake is.. Lan Wangji has many thoughts, yet little words to explain how much even the tiniest of mistakes can do in one's life.
Relationships: Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén & Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī, Lán Yuàn | Lán Sīzhuī & Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī, Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn
Comments: 12
Kudos: 88





	The Weight of Mistakes

,,What is so bad about making a mistake..?"

Lan Zhan froze as the voice of A-Yuan ringed so innocently in his ears. They were sitting together, working on one of the many homeworks the barely 6 years old boy had, together with Lan Xichen.

It was a simple question, one anyone would understand being asked.. yet Lan Zhan's complexion paled. He felt his heart throb, throat go dry and eyes burn.

What was so bad about making a mistake? Especially one as simple as the one A-Yuan had made? What could there be so horrible about a tiny boy with even smaller hands and such big and innocent eyes making a tiny and simply mistake in his writing..?

Lan Zhan couldn't help his mind from trailing off. He couldn't stop that his mind wandered to knowing the reason why his sect was so adamant about not making a single mistake. He understood.. oh how painfully, deeply he understood.

If one wouldn't learn how to avoid making even the simplest of mistakes early on.. No one would care why a mistake of any size was made later on in a person's life. No one would care if something was even a true mistake, as long as it was seen by enough people as one.

The battered and bruised Lan Wangji knew better than anyone how much a simple mistake can change. There were so many endless mistakes he had made. Such an endlessly long, painful list he was going through over and over again; every single day.

Not having listened, not having seen, not having talked, not having felt,.... Having turned away from someone who he never wished to turn away from, someone who everyone had turned their backs to already. Having wasted so much time, so many opportunities.. Those all appeared to be such tiny mistakes as he first made them.. but now, where everything had changed, and everything he hoped for was lost - those seemingly insignificant mistakes drowned him and had killed him the second he realised their true weight.

Wei Ying's mistakes.. Mistakes that were mistakes, yet at the same time they truly weren't, while some truly were. At the end however, no one had cared for his reasons, no one had tried to listen, no one had even cared.

They both paid for their mistakes. Most of which they themselves hadn't seen as a mistake at the time at all.

Who decided the weight, or worth, or importance of a mistake..? Fate? A teacher? A parent, like him? Who had the right to label or put value on something that could be something so huge, or absolutely nothing at all to the person who has made the mistake? How was he supposed to answer the question of such a young boy, while knowing everything about the world - while being entirely clueless about the way it works to this day?

A-Yuan stared wide-eyed over his shoulder at his now adoptive father. He couldn't understand, nor could the younger Jade look at him.. nor could he respond for a long time. The tiny boys gaze had by then shifted to his uncle who didn't look much better than his dad, his eyes full of child-like worry and questions left unasked.

,,Even if you may not understand why you have to correct this mistake yet.. You can never know how much of a difference even the smallest of mistakes can make on your future, or that of someone else one day. You have to try and correct them, when you notice them being made.. Remember that."

Lan Zhan only spoke after minutes,.. It was also one of the first times that he spoke so much at once, even towards the young boy. Whether he understood, or not, A-Yuan looked at his father with hesitation as if he was trying to imprint the words in his mind. A few moments passed before the boy nodded as if he had understood, turning around he wrote his entire homework again.

It was something only the two Lan brother's knew.. A-Yuan never made the same mistake again, and each and every single time this fact made his adoptive father so overwhelmingly sad and proud and hopeful all at once.


End file.
